The present invention is related to an automatic airport information transmitting apparatus for automatically transmitting information required for landings to aircraft that fly around a relatively small-scaled airport where a controller is not present in order to achieve safety flights of these aircraft.
FIG. 14 is a block diagram for showing the function of xe2x80x9cEVALUATION EXPERIMENT OF AIRPORT SURFACE SURVEILLANCE AND DISPLAY SYSTEMxe2x80x9d described in the abstract of the research lecture No. 27 held by the ELECTRONIC NAVIGATION RESERCH INSTITUTE of the Japanese Transport Ministry, pages 41 to 44, in 1995.
In FIG. 14, reference numeral 1 shows a radar antenna of an ASDE (Airport Surface Detection Equipment), reference numeral 2 indicates a transmitter for transmitting electromagnetic waves, and reference numeral 3 shows a receiver for receiving electromagnetic waves reflected from a target such as an aircraft, while the transmitter 2 transmits the electromagnetic waves. An airport surface detection equipment radar apparatus is constituted by employing the radar antenna 1, the transmitter 2, and the receiver 3. The airport surface detection equipment radar apparatus transmits electromagnetic waves to insides of an airport, and detects an airport surface by receiving radar signals reflected from a target such as an aircraft and then by overwriting the received radar signals on map information of the airport surface.
Also, reference numeral 4 denotes an ASDE target detecting apparatus for detecting a target position from the radar signal. Reference numeral 5 represents a trace processing apparatus for discriminating an aircraft by identifying a position of an aircraft and a discrimination code thereof as detected by the ASDE target detecting apparatus 4 and an ASR/SSR target detecting apparatus (will be discussed later) 8, and a flight-number code of the aircraft as received by an FDP (will be explained later) 9, and for outputting both the position and the flight-number of the discriminated aircraft. Reference numeral 6 shows an evaluation display apparatus for displaying aircraft positional information to which the discrimination code by the trace processing apparatus 5 are added.
Furthermore, reference numeral 7 shows an airport surveillance radar(ASR)/secondary airport surveillance radar(SSR) apparatus (will be referred to as an xe2x80x9cASR/SSRxe2x80x9d hereinafter), reference numeral 8 represents an ASR/SSR target detecting apparatus for detecting a target position (aircraft position) and a discrimination code of an aircraft from the radar signal of the ASR/CSR 7. Also, reference numeral 9 indicates a flight data processing system (will be referred to as an xe2x80x9cFDPxe2x80x9d hereinafter) on which a flight-number of an aircraft is described. It should be noted that reference numeral 13 indicates a waveguide selector.
Next, a description will now be made of operations.
The electromagnetic waves which are transmitted from the transmitter 2 via the radar antenna 1 to the inside of the airport are reflected from a target such as the aircraft, and then the reflected electromagnetic waves are received by the receiver 3 in the form of a radar signal. After reception, as to the radar signal received by the receiver 3, the ASDE target detecting apparatus 4 detects the amplitude of this radar signal, and calculates a position of an aircraft, while using such an amplitude of the radar signal, which is larger than a predetermined value, as an electromagnetic reflection from the aircraft.
Also, an aircraft which is flying around the airport reflects the electromagnetic waves emitted from the ASR/SSR 7, these electromagnetic waves are reflected as the radar signal. The ASR/SSR target detecting apparatus 8 detects the position of the aircraft by detecting as to whether or not the amplitude of this radar signal is large. Also, the beacon code of the aircraft is converted into the corresponding data by the interrogation signal sent from the SSR.
The trace processing apparatus 5 discriminates the aircraft by identifying the position of the aircraft and the discrimination code thereof to the flight-number code of the aircraft, and then displays both the position and the flight-number of the discriminated aircraft on the evaluation display apparatus 6. The first-mentioned position of the aircraft is detected by the ASDE target detecting apparatus 4. The discrimination code of the aircraft is detected by the ASR/SSR target detecting apparatus 8. The flight-number code of the aircraft is received by the FDP 9.
Since the conventional automatic airport surface aircraft discriminative display system is arranged by employing the above-explained arrangement, in a relatively large-scaled airport, or a relatively medium-scaled airport where a controller is present, the controller surveilles the positions of the aircraft, and communicates with the pilots of these aircraft via the mutual speech (voice) communications so as to execute the flight controls.
However, in a small-scaled airport where no controller is present, as to an aircraft which will land on this airport, after a pilot of this aircraft has made a visual confirmation of a condition within the airport, this aircraft should land at this airport. The pilot could not confirm the conditions of the airport, for example, the landing attitudes and the airport under taxing condition until this aircraft has approached the air zone in the vicinity of this airport. In particular, the aircraft could not land on the airport under such weather conditions as heavy rains and strong winds, and furthermore, there is a risk when the aircraft lands at this airport under such weather conditions.
The present invention has been made to solve the above-explained problems, and therefore, has an object to provide an automatic airport information transmitting apparatus for automatically transmitting such information required for landing operation to an aircraft flying in an air zone around an airport in order that a safety flight of this aircraft can be improved.
An automatic airport information transmitting apparatus, according to the present invention, is featured by comprising: airport-inside-target detecting means for detecting a target inside an airport; target judging means for judging a target moved in a place within the airport, which is required to surveille an aircraft based upon target position information derived from the airport-inside-target detecting means; and transmitting means for transmitting information of the target inside the airport judged by the target judging means to an aircraft which is flying around the airport in a wireless manner.
The automatic airport information transmitting apparatus is featured by further comprising: weather monitoring means for monitoring a weather condition around the airport; wherein: the transmitting means adds the weather information monitored by the weather monitoring means to the target information of the airport, and then transmits the resulting target information to the aircraft which is flying around the airport in the wireless manner.
The automatic airport information transmitting apparatus is featured by further comprising: an airport surveillance radar apparatus installed within the airport, for emitting electromagnetic waves to the peripheral area of the airport and for receiving radar signals reflected from the targets to thereby surveille the peripheral area of the airport; and approaching target detecting means for detecting that a target existing in the peripheral area of the airport has approached a predetermined area within the peripheral area of the airport in response to a reception signal from the airport surveillance radar apparatus; wherein: at least one of the airport-inside-target detecting means, the target judging means, and the transmitting means commences its operation only when the detection signal derived from the approaching target detecting means is inputted thereinto.
The automatic airport information transmitting apparatus is featured by further comprising: an airport surveillance radar apparatus installed within the airport, for emitting electromagnetic waves to the peripheral area of the airport and for receiving radar signals reflected from the targets to thereby surveille the peripheral area of the airport; approaching target detecting means for detecting that a target existing in the peripheral area of the airport has approached a predetermined area within the peripheral area of the airport in response to a reception signal from the airport surveillance radar apparatus; and position judging means for judging a mutual positional relationship in the case that a plurality of targets are detected by the approaching target detecting means; wherein: the transmitting means transmits positional information of other aircraft under flight to an aircraft under flight based upon the mutual positional relationship among the plurality of targets derived from the position judging means in the wireless manner.
The airport-inside-target detecting means includes: an airport surface detection equipment radar apparatus for detecting an airport surface in response to a radar signal which is received by emitting electromagnetic waves to the inside of the airport and by reflecting the electromagnetic waves from the target; and a target detecting apparatus for detecting a position of the target in response to the output signal from the airport surface detection equipment radar apparatus to output target position information.
The airport-inside-target detecting means includes: an industrial monitoring camera for monitoring the inside of the airport; and an image processing apparatus for processing an image acquired by the industrial monitoring camera by way of a pattern recognition manner to thereby detect the target.
The airport-inside-target detecting means includes: an infrared monitoring camera for monitoring the inside of the airport; and an image processing apparatus for processing an image acquired by the infrared monitoring camera by way of a pattern recognition manner to thereby detect the target.
The airport-inside-target detecting means includes: a noise monitoring microphone for monitoring the inside of the airport; and a speech target detecting apparatus for detecting a target in response to a noise level collected by the noise monitoring microphone.
The transmitting means is provided with: speech broadcasting means for transmitting transmission information by way of a speech broadcasting manner.
The transmitting means is provided with: message transmitting means for forming transmission information as a message of text information to thereby transmit the text information message.